Anthony Gold

Get in touch

020 7940 4060

  • People
  • Insights
  • What to Expect
  • Contact Us
Anthony Gold
  • Services
    • Housing And Property Disputes
      • Property Disputes
      • Leasehold Services
      • Services For Commercial Landlords, Tenants And Agents
      • Services For Residential Landlords And Agents
      • Housing And Tenancy Issues
      • Judicial Review
    • Injury And Medical Claims
      • Life Changing Injuries
      • Medical Claims
      • Personal Injury
      • Compensation And Life Planning
      • Child Abuse
    • Family And Relationships
      • Starting Relationships
      • Ending Relationships
      • After Relationships End
      • Capacity And Court Of Protection
      • Wills, Trusts And Estates
      • Family Mediation
      • Religious & Cultural Issues
      • Family Law FAQs
    • Business Services
      • Business Agreements
      • Business Disagreements
      • Commercial Property Agreements
      • Commercial Property Disputes
    • Property Services And Estates
      • Commercial Property
      • Leasehold Services
      • Residential Property
      • Wills, Trusts And Estates
      • Claims Against Trusts And Estates
    • Dispute Resolution For Individuals
      • Personal Claims
      • Professional Negligence
      • Home
      • Claims Against Trusts And Estates
      • Employment
    • People
    • Insights
    • What to Expect
    • Contact Us
  • Get in touch

    020 7940 4060

  • Housing and Property Disputes
  • Injury and Medical Claims
  • Family and Relationships
  • Business Services
  • Property Services and Estates
  • Dispute Resolution For Individuals
  • Property disputes
  • Ownership disputes and shares in property
  • Challenging the decisions of councils and public bodies
  • Rights of way, boundaries, covenants and easements
  • Party wall disputes
  • Building disputes
  • Civil and commercial mediation
  • Leasehold services
  • Lease extension
  • Collective enfranchisement
  • Service charge disputes
  • Repairs to leaseholds
  • Right to manage
  • Services for commercial landlords, tenants and agents
  • Breach of covenant
  • Forfeiture and recovery of possession
  • Dilapidations and failing to repair
  • Lease renewals
  • Services for residential landlords and agents
  • Regulatory issues
  • Repossession
  • Agents (including letting agreements)
  • Housing and tenancy issues
  • Repairs
  • Repossession and eviction
  • Rehousing and homelessness
  • Judicial review
  • Life changing injuries
  • Brain injury
  • Spinal cord injury
  • Amputation
  • Psychiatric injury
  • Fatal injuries and inquests
  • Medical claims
  • Surgical claims
  • Non-Surgical Claims
  • Birth injury
  • Child health and paediatrics
  • GP and primary care treatment
  • Private healthcare
  • Personal injury
  • Road traffic accidents
  • Accidents abroad
  • Accidents at work
  • Faulty products
  • Public liability and other accidents
  • Compensation and life planning
  • Capacity and court of protection
  • Starting and ending relationships
  • Buying and selling your home
  • Child abuse
  • Child abuse
  • Starting relationships
  • Pre nuptial agreements
  • Pre civil partnership and same sex relationship agreements
  • Cohabitation and living together agreements
  • Property ownership agreements
  • Ending relationships
  • Divorce and separation
  • Ending a civil partnership
  • Ending cohabitation
  • Agreeing parenting
  • Agreeing finance and assets
  • International arrangements
  • Abduction and leave to remove children
  • Family mediation
  • After relationships end
  • Abduction and leave to remove children
  • Changing and challenging parenting agreements
  • Changing and challenging financial agreements
  • Grandparents' rights
  • Capacity and court of protection
  • Appointing a deputy
  • Removing a deputy
  • Arranging lasting power of attorney
  • Gifts and legacies
  • Managing assets under a deputyship
  • Care issues
  • Removing lasting and enduring power of attorney
  • Special educational needs
  • Wills, trusts and estates
  • Making a will
  • Contesting a will
  • Applying for probate
  • Distributing the estate
  • Trust advice
  • Tax planning and advice
  • Capacity and court of protection
  • Family mediation
  • Family Mediation
  • Religious & cultural issues
  • Jewish family law
  • Islamic family law
  • Family Law FAQs
  • Children FAQs
  • Cohabitation Agreement FAQs
  • Divorce and Separation FAQs
  • Financial Issues FAQs
  • Pre-Marital Contracts FAQs
  • Business agreements
  • Business advice
  • Employment
  • Mergers and acquisitions
  • Supplier contracts
  • Business disagreements
  • Building disputes
  • Civil and commercial mediation
  • Claims against directors
  • Contract disputes
  • Debt recovery
  • Directors personal liabilities
  • Employment
  • Professional negligence
  • Commercial property agreements
  • Commercial advice for landlords and tenants
  • Commercial Sale and Purchases
  • Planning advice
  • Mortgage debentures and securities
  • Commercial property disputes
  • Breach of covenant
  • Dilapidations and failing to repair
  • Forfeiture and recovery of possession
  • Lease renewals
  • Commercial property
  • Commercial Sale and Purchases
  • Commercial lease advice for Landlords and Tenants
  • Commercial loans and mortgages
  • Property Investment: plot developers & plot buyers
  • Auction: sales and purchases
  • Leasehold services
  • Lease extension
  • Collective enfranchisement
  • Service charge disputes
  • Repairs to leaseholds
  • Right to manage
  • Residential property
  • Residential Sale and Purchases
  • Property Investment: plot developers & plot buyers
  • Remortgages
  • Auction: sales and purchases
  • Ownership matters and transfers
  • Wills, trusts and estates
  • Contesting a will
  • Making a will
  • Applying for probate
  • Distributing the estate
  • Trust advice
  • Tax planning and advice
  • Polish Clients
  • Claims against trusts and estates
  • Contesting a will
  • Losses caused by trustees
  • Capacity and court of protection
  • Personal claims
  • Contesting a will
  • Debt recovery
  • Ownership disputes and shares in property
  • Losses caused by trustees
  • Civil and commercial mediation
  • Professional negligence
  • Professional Negligence
  • Property Fraud
  • Investment Fraud
  • Medical claims
  • Home
  • Building disputes
  • Personal injury
  • Ownership disputes and shares in property
  • Claims against trusts and estates
  • Contesting a will
  • Losses caused by trustees
  • Polish Clients
  • Employment
  • Employment
  • Unfair or Wrongful Dismissal
  • Settlement Agreements
Anthony Gold > Blog > Whittaker v Hancock: Obtaining a grant of probate for an attorney
Clare Kelly - Partner

Clare Kelly

Partner| Mediator

clare_kelly@anthonygold.co.uk

Share
  • February 5, 2019
  • Blog
  • By  Clare Kelly 
  • 0 comments

Whittaker v Hancock: Obtaining a grant of probate for an attorney


The case of Whittaker v Hancock [2018] EWHC 3478 (Ch) dealt with a complicated and unusual probate problem, and required some creative thinking in order to unlock an estate! I acted for the successful Claimant, along with Richard Devereux-Cooke of 3 Stone.

The matter concerned the estate of John Parker deceased, the second husband of Margaret Parker. John died in March 2016.  In July 2016, I was instructed by Margaret’s daughter Jan Whittaker, as attorney for Margaret.  Jan had power of attorney for her mother who had lost capacity and was in a nursing home.  John’s will appointed Margaret and his niece, Christine Hancock, as executors of his estate – it is a small estate worth approximately £60,000 on top of a number of assets that have passed to Margaret as a joint tenant.  I was instructed because John’s daughter Linda Davidson, had entered a caveat and sent a letter before action threatening an Inheritance Act claim.   Linda had expressly been left out of the will, with the reasons explained in a side letter.

I immediately invited Linda’s solicitors to remove the caveat so that we could administer the estate and deal with the Inheritance Act claim.  They refused to do so.  A warning was served, and an appearance entered making very general allegations that the will might be invalid.  No further explanation or evidence was ever provided supporting those allegations.  Unfortunately, what followed was a period of complete deadlock.

Jan and Christine had started the process of administration prior to the caveat being entered.  However, it was not possible to get a Grant because of the caveat.  Christine did not wish to renounce her role as executor but was advised that she faced a possible costs liability in taking action to remove the caveat, so did not wish to do so.  As Christine would neither renounce or take action, Jan could not easily clear her off in order to take an attorney grant.  It was impossible to use a citation (as the executor had intermeddled), and we did not want to remove Christine under s50 Administration of Justice Act 1985 (she had not done anything wrong after all).  In any event, that would not deal with the caveat issue.

All this time, we were unable to make any progress on dealing with the claim against the estate, and Margaret’s health was worsening meaning that her need for funding was increasing all the time.

Eventually, in an attempt to bring matters to a head, proceedings were issued by Jan under s50 for an attorney grant (jointly with Christine), and removal of the caveat.  In order to limit the time and costs of the application, everything was dealt with in one claim.  Margaret was named as a Defendant to the matter although (as Master Shuman pointed out) an alternative way of proceeding would have been to bring the proceedings in Margaret’s name with Jan as her litigation friend.  Proceedings were issued and served.  At the end of September 2018, Linda Davidson finally admitted that she was not proceeding with any challenge to the will.  Master Shuman immediately ordered that the caveat be removed so that a grant could issue whilst reserving judgment on other issues.

Master Shuman confirmed in her judgment that Jan had the right to an attorney grant, and could act jointly with Christine.  However, by the date of judgment the caveat had been removed and a grant was in the process of issuing to Christine so there was no need for Jan to take a grant herself.  Proceedings have now been issued under the Inheritance Act so that progress can finally be made – almost three years after John’s death.

This was an unusual application, made following an unusual set of facts which led to deadlock in the estate.  Hopefully, this sort of application will not be one which is often required!

Clare Kelly - Partner

Clare Kelly

Partner| Mediator

clare_kelly@anthonygold.co.uk

  • A compassionate solicitor who considers all of her client’s concerns, and advises on the best way to resolve them, in or out of court.
  • Achieves settlements which are suitable for the individual circumstances incorporating compensation payments, the transfer of property and setting up trusts for children.
  • Completed the ACTAPS (Association of Contentious Trust and Probate Specialists) Contentious Trusts and Probate course – the only specialist training course for this area of law.
  • Qualified Commercial and Civil Mediator, accredited by the ADR Group.
  • Recommended in The Legal 500 ‘Clare Kelly is exceptionally knowledgeable and extremely efficient, and is a good negotiator who is sensitive to her clients’ needs and finds practical solutions’
  • ‘has a great eye for detail but can also identify the crux of the dispute’ – Legal 500 2019
  • Recommended by clients:
    “[Clare] has been absolutely wonderful – so lovely, extremely bright, and a rock when it came to getting us through the last two years.”
    “Clare, you are a star of the highest order!!”
    “It has been a difficult and stressful case and you have dealt with it efficiently and skilfully and with warmth and sensitivity”.
    “Your skill, your expertise, in matters concerning Wills is I believe, second to none. Both myself and my wife will be forever in your debt….Saying thank you just doesn’t cover the gratitude and respect we both have for you.”

 

Get in touch

Call, email or use a contact form – whichever suits you. We’ll let you know the best person to help you get started.

Call or Email

020 7940 4060

mail@anthonygold.co.uk

No comments

Add your comment

We need your name and email address to make sure you’re a real person. We won’t share your email address with anyone else or send you spam. Please complete fields marked with *.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

code

Sign up to our email newsletter

For news, help and advice.

Sign up now

Related Services

  • Agreeing finance and assets

  • Agreeing finance and assets

  • Applying for probate

  • Applying for probate

  • Building disputes

  • Building disputes

  • Building disputes

  • Civil and commercial mediation

  • Civil and commercial mediation

  • Civil and commercial mediation

  • Claims against directors

  • Contesting a will

  • Contesting a will

  • Contesting a will

  • Debt recovery

  • Debt recovery

  • Contract disputes

  • Distributing the estate

  • Gifts and legacies

  • Losses caused by trustees

  • Losses caused by trustees

  • Planning advice

About the author

  • Clare Kelly

Meet the team

  • Property Services and Estates

  • Business Services

  • Dispute Resolution For Individuals

You might also like...

  • Property Ownership - Joint owners and distribution of profits

  • Property Ownership - The Basics Explained

  • Appointment of an Independent Administrator

About Us

  • Accessibility
  • Compliance
  • Corporate Social Responsibility
  • Equality & Diversity
  • History
  • Our Beliefs
  • List of Partners

Accredited by

Lexel Parctice
76000Award

Careers

  • Trainee Solicitors
  • Vacancies

Solicitors in London Bridge

Solicitors in Elephant and Castle

Solicitors in Streatham

Follow us on Twitter Follow us on LinkedIn View our YouTube channel

Get in touch

020 7940 4060



Anthony Gold

Contact Us

Anthony Gold

Request a callback

Copyright © Anthony Gold Solicitors. All rights reserved. Authorised and Regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority Number 48050

Site managed by Prism Production. Brand by David Carroll & Co.